Primarily, M4M is a global coalition serving church planting movements with media, technology, and the arts to multiply disciples among unreached people groups. That said, we also often use the term to describe a process or strategy whereby we serve movements to develop simple, affordable, easily reproducible ways to spread the gospel and multiply disciples. We accomplish this by carefully listening to movement leaders and asking them questions to discover their specific needs and challenges. As God directs us, we identify solutions and next steps to take together.

M4M currently acts as the primary way we interact with movements, we’re spearheading the coalition, and we actively advertise and advance the coalitions goals and vision – primarily by attending conferences on behalf of M4M, running social media and issuing the newsletter, and running the Media4Movements Consultation.

The 20/20 Vision was an effort that Create spearheaded,  in partnership with the Body of Christ, to produce a contextual evangelistic media tool for every one of the Least Evangelized Mega Peoples (with a population over a million). This goal insured that 75% of all unreached people would have an indigenous Gospel presentation by the year 2020. This goal was completed but it is frequently referenced.

For detailed descriptions: https://missionexus.org/the-c1-c6-spectrum-after-fifteen-years/

The C1–C6 Spectrum was initially developed as a means to categorize six distinct types of communities formed by individuals born into Muslim backgrounds who later embraced Christianity. Each category represents a unique manifestation of Christ-centered community, denoted by the letter “C” within the spectrum’s name. However, this framework has since been adapted for use beyond Muslim contexts and now extends to other socioreligious settings, including Hindu and Buddhist environments.

The C-Spectrum is framed around two central issues: (1) the socioreligious identity of fellowships of Jesus-followers who were born Muslim/Hindu/Buddhist and (2) the linguistic, cultural, and religious forms they use. It is assumed that each of these types of Christ-centered communities follows Jesus as the risen Lord and Savior and the Bible as God’s word. Any group along the C-Spectrum could, however, become sub-biblical if adherence to scripture becomes weak. The following is a brief description of the six basic types of Christ-centered communities.

C1

The first type of Christ-centered community, which I called C1, refers to churches in Global South that uses distinctly “Christian” forms (music, liturgy, architecture, prayer posture, etc.) and hold their worship services in languages other than the mother tongue of the surrounding population. Thousands of these churches exist in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa, some of them predating Islam (e.g., Eastern Orthodox and Armenian churches).

C2

C2 refers to churches similar to C1, except that the worship is conducted in the mother tongue of the surrounding population. However, although they use the daily language of the local population in worship, they seldom use the same religious terms as local Muslims, Hindus, or Buddhists—such as Isa for Jesus, Yahya for John the Baptist, or Zabur for Psalms. In terms of socioreligious identity, the central issue of the C-Spectrum, members of C1 and C2 fellowships refer to themselves as Christians or by the name of their denomination/church (e.g., Orthodox, Catholic, or Coptic). Muslim, Buddhist, and Hindu -background believers are found in various C2 congregations or in specialized subgroups associated with them.

C3

C3 refers to fellowships that incorporate local or indigenous ethnic and cultural forms such as music, dress, and artwork rather than distinctively Western or Christian ones. C3 groups thus aim to develop indigenous expressions of congregational life while avoiding forms that appear “Islamic”, “Hindu”, or “Buddhist”. Using only the Muslim context for a moment, an underlying assumption of C3 groups, is that “cultural” and “Islamic” forms can be separated in Muslim societies. C3 groups would typically avoid using Muslim terminology. As with C1 and C2 communities, C3 groups refer to themselves as Christian.

C4

The fourth type, C4, differs from C3 in that instead of avoiding Islamic/Hindu/Buddhist forms (religious terminology, holidays, personal names, diet, dress, prayer posture, etc.), these groups retain them, filling them where necessary with new biblical meaning. In general, they avoid the label “Christian” due to the unfortunate cultural baggage it carries. C4 groups tend to refer to themselves as “followers of Isa” or in other, similar terms that focus on Jesus and allegiance to him.

C5

The fifth type of Christ-centered community, C5, consists of groups of people who follow Jesus as Lord and Savior and the Bible as God’s word without taking the step of leaving the religious community of their birth. Some C5 groups relate with Christian-background believers for friendship and spiritual interaction, but they form and lead their own groups for prayer, fellowship, and Bible study. By remaining part of their socioreligious communities, they are a source of salt and light for family and friends.

The C-Spectrum does not attempt to describe C5 in terms of linguistic, cultural, and religious forms, as there is too much variance worldwide to discern a common pattern. As a general category of the C-Spectrum, what makes a C5 type of group distinct is maintaining a Muslim, Buddhist, or Hindu socioreligious identity. In other words, they integrate the practice of their biblical faith in Jesus into their everyday life in the religious community of their birth. A “C5 movement” would therefore be synonymous with an insider movement. C5 group members sometimes refer to themselves with various descriptions such as “Holy Spirit Muslims,” “Muslim believers,” “Muslim followers of Jesus,” or simply “Muslims.”

C6

Finally, C6 refers to the many small and scattered groups of Jesus followers who are underground, isolated, or restricted in their ability to meet. Their context limits their ability to gather openly and makes public witness difficult, yet many find creative ways to connect with other Jesus-followers and share the good news discreetly as God’s Spirit leads. Similar to C5, these Jesus-followers retain their Muslim identity as they follow Jesus as Lord and Savior. As with C5, the C-Spectrum does not attempt to describe them in terms of linguistic, cultural, or religious forms.

In the realm of Christian missions, we employ the terms “Muslim Background Believer” (MBB), “Hindu Background Believer” (HBB), and “Buddhist Background Believer” (BBB) to characterize individuals who were brought up in the religious traditions of Islam, Hinduism, or Buddhism but have subsequently embraced Christianity. These designations serve to acknowledge the religious heritage of these believers and the distinctive path of their faith journey. This transformation often entails a profound change in religious identity and can entail various challenges, encompassing societal, familial, and occasionally even legal pressures.

The Engel scale, conceived by James F. Engel, serves as a framework illustrating the progression from a lack of awareness about God to achieving spiritual maturity as a devoted Christian believer. This model is employed by certain Christians to underscore the conversion process and the series of decisions individuals make when embarking on their path towards becoming committed Christians. The initial framework ran from -8 through to 0 and then onto +5, but different versions are used frequently.

+5 Stewardship
+4 Communion with God
+3 Conceptual and behavioural growth
+2 Incorporation into Body
+1 Post-decision evaluation
0 New birth
-1 Repentance and faith in Christ
-2 Decision to act
-3 Personal problem recognition
-4 Positive attitude towards Gospel
-5 Grasp implications of Gospel
-6 Awareness of fundamentals of Gospel
-7 Initial awareness of Gospel
-8 Awareness of supreme being, no knowledge of Gospel
-9 Unawareness of supreme being
-10 Resistance or antagonism to the concept of a supreme being

Create often makes use of this scale when considering a possible goal, or end-result, for those watching our resources. We are aware that our tools are part of a larger process whereby someone grows closer to God. Using the scale gives us shared vocabulary, particularly when working our where an individual inside a group could be on the scale, and where on the scale that person could be after watching the resource.

The DTS is a six month program blending classroom learning, small group activities, personal reflection, practical service, and community living. Most often, the training comes in two parts: lecture phase and outreach phase. The DTS is a requirement for joining any YWAM ministry (including Create) as “Full-time Staff” or, as we call it, “Team Staff”. Our “Community Staff” role does not have this requirement. 

We often employ acronyms when describing everything naming schools. Knowing what these are, and also having a general idea of what the school covers, is most certainly needed in Create.

FFS – Our Frontier Filmmaking Seminar is designed to provide students with the experience of being a production assistant on an actual cross-cultural film crew. It is usually a six-week school, and students have the opportunity to become part of the crew and help create a film for an unreached people group. We cover basic training in a variety of filmmaking disciplines and share our unique cross-cultural methods to communicate the gospel of Jesus Christ. Create Mobile spearheads this training, and you can find more on their website

AniMissions – The AniMissions Seminar (Not an acronym!?) is a seven-week online course focused on training individuals and teams to produce animated short films. It is spearheaded by the AniMissions team and run through Campfire.

CBM – The Create Children’s Books for Missions course is an Online Course that teaches you how to write and/or illustrate high-quality, biblically-based, picture storybooks in a way that makes the Gospel of Jesus relevant and familiar to children in their own culture. It is run by the Create Seeds team through Campfire.

FFSO – The Frontier Filmmaking Seminar Online (FFSO) is an 8-week seminar that prepares students to create films that communicate the Gospel across cultures through skill-building and hands-on practice encouraged in a virtual video classroom. It is similar to the FFS, but not an exact copy just stuck online. It is spearheaded by Mobile through Campfire.

FCS – The Frontier Comics Seminar (FCS) is a six-week seminar that helps students hone their cartooning and comics skills while using them to reach the least, the last and the lost with the hope of the Gospel. It is spearheaded by the AniMissions team and run through Campfire.

The School of Frontier Media (SFM) was the first YWAM UofN school we developed and maintained, and many in YWAM know us because of this school. Much of what we learnt through the SFM made its way into the SoCAM (the School of Cartooning and Animation), the Visual Arts for Missions (VAM) school, and the FFS. We no longer run the SFM, VAM, or SoCAM. The CIDTS was a Discipleship Training School that operated in Thailand and is no longer run.